Well, here we are…. just days away from giving birth to our first child that we had prayed so very hard for. After almost 5 years we will finally enter the “parenthood club.” It is amazing that it is already almost over! We are ready for her and the waiting game has officially started.

With the impending arrival of our angel baby more people have been asking about what hospital, delivery, when we will be induced etc. I wanted to do a short post on what our plan was (I could probably write a book at this point with the information I have collected over the years), but I will save you with the cliff notes version. In a nutshell we are using a birth center instead of a hospital. We have been seeing a midwife (who I adore) since week 9 and no, there will be no pain medication! We will be less than 5 miles from a hospital, so if something were to happen we are not far. Don’t worry…I am not a hippie (even though some of you who knew me in college may think differently.) 🙂 I believe that every woman should have some education on childbirth and she is allowed the decision on how to bring her children into this world. If your interested in more details, read below!

Ever since I can remember I have wanted to have a natural child birth. I never quite knew what that entailed, but I knew I wanted to experience having a baby as God intended.. pain and all. The way I saw it was that our ancestors had done without epidurals, pain medication, C-sections etc. Why couldn’t I do it if they did? Now don’t get me wrong.. I am VERY grateful for modern medicine and there are instances where intervention is needed, but most babies can be born without any.

When we first started trying to have a baby four years ago I started researching natural child birth. The statistics I found were startling. Did you know in 1900 around 95% of all births were in the home? The story goes that in the early 1900 that physicians began a smear campaign in order to discredit midwifes/home births and make them seem out of date. The gleaming, clean, hospitals began to be portrayed as the newer, safer method for childbirth. There is also the ever present epidural argument. I have heard from so many woman that they would rather get an epidural so they could no longer feel the pain of childbirth. It does kill the pain, but also kills natural contractions. So.. then comes pitocin! Pitocin makes contractions longer, stronger and closer together, which cause more pain and usually another epidural. This is a very stressful situation for mom and baby. And usually after a short amount of time a cesarean is often ordered. I don’t even want to get started to C-sections, but realize that in 1965 there was a 4.5% cesarean rate and in 2010 it was at 33%! That is 1 in 3 women having a c section! And the most recent trend is scheduling C sections because woman think it is easier! What really made me angry a few years ago was when my 23 year old sister’s doctor let her SCHEDULE a c-section! Seriously??!! Doctors (or hospitals) don’t seem to have the time to wait around for a woman to labor naturally, so alternate measures are usually used (epidurals,pitocin, c-sections.) My opinion is hospitals, insurance & drug companies are in bed together. It’s all about making money. Did you know it is almost impossible to get insurance companies to cover birth centers? I find this insane because it is so much cheaper for a low risk woman to give birth at home or in a birth center! It makes no sense!Everyone who I have talked to that has had a natural (no drugs) birthing experience has nothing but amazing things to say about how it went, the initial bonding with the baby was incredible and quicker recoveries. Realize labor “work” is a natural process of having a child and drugs decrease performance and no amount of mimicking contractions or covering pain will help your body do what God intended it to and in turn is a greater chance medial intervention will be necessary.

After all of the research and watching many documentaries on the subject, we decided on a birthing center. I HIGHLY recommend watching “The Business of Being Born.” (Its on Netflix) It is a little over an hour and it will give you an idea of your choices. And that my friends is wealth… the knowledge to make a decision regarding your body and baby. At first my husband was a little apprehensive because just about everyone imagines their baby being born at a hospital, but he is completely on board now and I think excited to see how it all will happen as well!

We decided to take Bradley Method classes (Husband coached childbirth) to get us prepared for labor. It was a wonderful experience. Not only to be more educated on the birthing/labor process, but also to being with other couples who have the same thoughts on child birth and due dates around the same time. Even though it was a 12 week class for 2 hours a week, we really looked forward to it every week! I highly recommend looking into Bradley classes if you want to have a natural birth either at home, a birth center, or even a hospital.

So… this post ended up longer than I thought, but I wanted to write down my thoughts and opinions on our decision because I felt that I was having to explain myself so often. As I said, each woman is entitled to choose how they want to give birth and has options. I pray she researches them beforehand instead of doing as the masses do and not knowing why.